Monday, November 29, 2010

Art EveryDay - EveryWhere in EveryWay

Here I am in day 29 of the Art Everyday Month Challenge. It has been amazing, in both subtle and obvious ways. I feel infused with a soulful creative expression that is pure delight. I feel humbled, touched and boosted by the living practices of Life as Art, Love as Art and Art as Meditation. Here are written and visual snapshots of the final week of Art Everyday Nuggets.

The Art of Visioning: I see a flourishing, functional, thriving Ecovillage, with beautiful green/solar/wind powered facilities, including homes, guest cottages, retreat center, dance/event space, school, ropes course, sweat lodge, permaculture gardens, goats, chickens, wild spaces, art spaces, zen gardens, sanctuary, aligned community and home. Did I mention it has a river running through the property and is perpetually financially fueled by a multimillion dollar endowment? You get the picture. Visioning is an Art. Dare to vision into the miraculous.

The Art of Family Reunion: Thanksgiving week found us rejoicing with family in town from CA, AZ and FL. Surrendering to the joy of kids bouncing off walls and running down halls, tracking 3 or 4 conversations at once, and 'tai chi-ing' the needs, preferences and rhythms of many people for several days - was true art. We had a blast, and stayed committed to real connection & love.

The Art Of Nature: The natural world is rich with inspiring masterpieces of art. Today as we hiked the gorgeous canyons of the Sonoran desert, I found myself creating pujas of earth sculpture and mandala prayers. Autumn kissed leaves danced around circles of stones glistening with mica specs. Rock balancing meditations, and fairy houses constructed of twigs and golden grasses were embraced within the backdrop of striking mountains and vast blue sky. Mother nature, the original Earth Artist is a potent teacher of impermanence and eternal beauty all at once.

The Art Of Collage: Some of you already know that I am a serious collage junkie. It has been a heart practice of mine for many moons. I love how bits of paper of people, places, images and color somehow come together, effortlessly to express a depth that words cannot touch. As cards, prayers, full/new moon vision boards and beyond, collage art rocks!

The Art of Movement: Running through foothills trails like a bounding deer, my heart pumps and leaps with the joie de vivre. Wind in my hair, sun shine on my face-I am not dreaming of heaven, I am living it. Followed by a yoga asana set on my front patio amidst full moon and big top sky, I am refreshed, chakras flowing with life force, body supple, mind clear, heart open.

The Art of Soul Dance: A sister to The Art of Movement, the soul dance is informed by an authentic impulse to express freedom from the inside out. I love ecstatic dance. It is medicine. Flowing, rhythmic and provocative music, a dance floor, and the sacred space to ignite and shake it all loose is bliss to me. Soul dance is a practice of love, a devotion, a prayer, a joy, a healing salve, elixir and most definitely an art.

The Art Of Zen Homemaking: Simply caring for home, cooking, cleaning and doing laundry can be regenerative and enjoyable. Today, Kenya, Talia and I blended our chores with crafting and art-making all day long. My sense of relaxation, gratitude and love shifted my tasks from suffering to sanctuary. Check out my greatest inspiration of Zen Homemaking, Karen Maezen Miller. She says, "The kitchen is not only the heart of a home, it can also be the heart of our mindfulness practice. In cooking and cleaning, we move beyond ourselves and into compassionate care of everything and everyone around us."

This concludes my 4 part series on Art Everyday. Honorable mention also goes to The Art of Tickling, Wrestling, Relating, Goofing and Doing Nothing. I am eternally grateful for the meditation, exploration, and experiment this month has been. I see clearly that the spirit of soulful, creative expression is everywhere! Life as art really is art everyday in every way. Thanks for coming along on the ride and please comment to this post and let me know what you have learned about your life as art this month! All Love, Gabriela

4 comments:

What I have enjoyed most about reading your four- part Art Everyday series is the challenge it sparks in me to look at my days in a new way. I was especially struck by Karen Maezen Miller's piece that you linked a few days ago. The quotation above in your Art of Zen Homemaking entry is the very sentence I pulled from that link and posted to my FB status a few days ago. In my recent forays into domesticity, to look at each and every moment as a blessing, as compassionate care and love for my family completely changed my perspective on how I look at those seemingly mundane chores. I found myself joyfully chopping vegetables and doing the dishes instead of standing at the sink... again, and again, and then again. Cool shift! I also loved the language, your naming of the Art of your day. It challenges me to get out there, to desire to create, and to look at my days more creatively as well-remembering who I am as a person, a mother, and a wife. I love dance as well, as you know, but for some reason, I am very challenged by ecstatic dance, I have not figured out where my hold up is there...but I get held up. I relish the opportunity to tap into this. I do realize I can do this on my own, but my inner voice stops me. Interesting. : - )Love you G.,J.

J! Love you and love the big open heart with which you embrace your life and yourself as living Art! Yes yes to the art of Zen Homemaking. What an important art it is...the heart of home is the love that infuses it. And i figure if I have to do something again and again and again and again and again, i better make it divine service or I will be miserable. And on the Ecstatic dance tip-love up your inner voice and go get your bliss on! It is the free dance. Soul dance nourishes something that no other technique dance can touch. This was my number 1 early motherhood movement prayer. It feeds so much at once. Makes me think of your amazing vocal talent and the stretch to improvise...to be unknown and free in the exploration of voice, movement, etc...IS ecstasy! Let's talk more about this! xx,G